Would you, if you could, put yourself, your friends or family into a computer game? To date, some narcissistic gamers have had to spend hours fiddling with code-y bits to get their likenesses on digital personae, or get special equipment or services to do it for them. According to an article in New Scientist last week, researchers in Germany have announced an animation tool which lets non-techie types upload their images into computer games in a matter of minutes. A boon for machinima makers!

"We are most interested in using it to generate 3D video," says de Aguiar, "but it's a versatile technique that can have other uses." One application could be to import a person's scan as an avatar into a computer game or virtual world, he says.

There have been many attempts to increase the immersion of video games, many quirky (smell-o-vision, fishing rod controllers), some opportunistic (advertising), and personalisation has become a resourceful commodity in online games. Recent research suggests that even the size of the TV screen can have an effect on the impact of a media format on the viewer.

However, there are concerns with the existing realism in games, and new ways of importing even more realistic avatars and scenes will probably be viewed as dangerous by anti-game bodies. Some mods have already come under fire in high-profile videogame violence testimony; it's not difficult to see where concerns would be raised if you were to import your boss into Manhunt 2.